Kitabı oku: «Dear Paris»

Dear Paris:

The Dream Man Next Door

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Copyright © 2019 - Laura Paulsen

All rights reserved.

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 1

Sharon made herself comfortable in her fluffy pink house suit, with a plate of chocolate muffins and a cup of Capucchino, with lots of whipped cream on it, on her cozy couch in the living room. Criminal Minds, one of her favorite series. Today she had already seen "News 24", a few soaps and "The perfect dinner" and after the crime thriller the celebrity magazine "Red, stars and lifestyle" would follow.

It was a perfectly normal, average day in Sharon's life. Television consumption today was limited. She had repeatedly taken TV breaks and in the course of the day cleaned the apartment, washed laundry and had been shopping. But there were other days as well. Days on which she sat down in front of the television for breakfast in the morning and only switched it off in the evening to go to sleep. Only interrupted by toilets and kitchen corridors.

Tomorrow the annual "Jungle Camp" would start again. She was really looking forward to it. It was always fun for her to watch the more or less prominent participants arguing, passing disgusting exams or just talking. Even though it was trash TV, a television program with little level, she had her pleasure in it. For her it was good entertainment that sweetened the evening she spent alone in her living room on the couch. Why shouldn't I?

What else did she have to do but sit in front of the TV? Of course she took care of her household, and that even very neatly, and she went shopping. After all, people do not live by watching television alone, they also have to eat something. Whereby the "eating something" with pleasure degenerated into regular eating orgies. She lived alone, was single for four years. So there was no one with whom she shared her life and who could tell her about her and their eating orgies. Someone who did something with her and maybe even kicked her in the ass in a friendly way if she was so phlegmatic and let herself go. Although also the parents and her sister Melanie made some remarks about her appearance and her inertia from time to time. But how she really lived, sitting in front of the TV all day, she didn't tell anyone. The contact to her family was not very close, especially not the contact to her parents. She saw and spoke these only sporadically.

Sharon had never been the slimmest. She had always been a little overweight. Even as a child she had been a little dumpling, which earned her one or the other bad remark of other children already at that time. Now that she was unemployed and no longer had a regular working day, she had gained even more weight within two years due to the little exercise and her unrestrained desire to eat. She was now at a weight of 122 kilos with a height of 1.65m. She even understood it when she was not seen as the ideal candidate for a new position in sales. In the meantime, she had applied for about 250 positions. Ten applications per month were mandatory. It was in her integration agreement with the job center. Of course there were not so many vacancies in bakeries and she was obliged to apply as a salesperson in other areas as well. She had already applied to discounters, snack bars, delicatessens, beverage stores and boutiques. But also as a kitchen aid and for serving food in schools.

No one had wanted to hire her. Sometimes she cheated a little, and in her application list for the job centre she also mentioned a few companies where she had only copied the address from the Internet, but had never applied. Finding ten vacancies a month that matched her was not easy, especially after such a long time. She couldn't have to the same companies she had already applied to.

From tomorrow, however, there would be a change in their daily routine for a short time. From tomorrow she had to go to application training, to which she had been ordered by the job center. They called it an "invitation", but if you stayed away from the "invitation", you had to reckon with sanctions, which meant that part of your unemployment benefit was cancelled - for up to three months. So she bit the bullet and would take part in these five days of application training starting tomorrow. Although she didn't think it would get her anywhere. What she lacked was no knowledge of the competition but a handsome figure. Surely nobody expected a bakery saleswoman or a saleswoman in general to have model measurements, but also not to look like a walrus.

At least the application training would make sure that she got out of her apartment and among people. For a long time she left the apartment almost exclusively to do her shopping. Sometimes she would visit someone. That was usually her sister. Or there used to be an appointment at the job center. But otherwise she avoided going out since she got fatter and fatter. So she didn't have to listen to stupid comments about her looks or endure the disparaging glances she kept meeting.

But she also knew that if things went on like this, she would gain more weight and at some point she would hardly be able to move. She already noticed that climbing the stairs was more difficult for her and that her joints were aching and that she was very tired very quickly when she walked a little bit. She was out of condition - and that at just 32 years of age! What if she should actually get a job? How should she manage the work with her overweight and her current bad condition at all? The work in sales was physically exhausting, because you could hardly ever sit down, at most in a short breather when there was no customer in the shop or during lunch break. But these thoughts she pushed aside with pleasure, just like again tonight.

She bit off one of the chocolate muffins with relish and licked the chocolate crumbs from her mouth.

"Yum!"

Freshly baked, still lukewarm inside and peppered with chocolate chips. If she could do anything, then it was bake and cook.

Well, at least something I'm good for, she thought and put the rest of the muffin in her mouth. Also the other five muffins on her plate had to believe it on this television evening. For a short moment the guilty conscience arose to have eaten all six muffins in a row again. She could have divided the muffins into two evenings or eaten half of them for breakfast the next morning. That would certainly have been better for her figure and a first beginning to lose weight.

But the guilty conscience only lasted for a moment. She was full, it had tasted good and she felt a bit happy somehow. The fact that chocolate released happiness hormones was well known - so you could also see that she had done something good for herself. She had done something for a little luck. Even if this happiness lasted only for a short time. The cat's jammer usually followed.

He also did not miss this evening. For when she slipped out of her jogging suit at midnight and into her pyjamas, she took a look in the mirror of her wardrobe. What she saw there she didn't like at all - and all of a sudden the feelings of happiness and the good mood that she was in just a few minutes ago, on her couch in front of the TV, fell over.

Sitting had had and turned into the opposite.

"That's not a figure, that's a disaster!" she sobbed shaking her head.

"No wonder I'm single and unemployed. Who wants to do something like that to themselves and have to see me all day or even touch me?"

She reached into her non-existent waist with both hands and turned a little back and forth to look at herself from all sides.

"Just look at that swimming tire around your belly and those thighs and that fat ass!" she shouted to her reflection.

Though fat asses were trendy right now. Yes, if only he were alone!

"If the Kardashians or Nicki Minajs of this world had these swim rings around their waist and these rammers as legs besides their fat ass, they wouldn't be so hot!"

So this day ended in a sea of tears and Sharon cried himself frustrated to sleep. Not for the first time, because the rage about her appearance and her regular craving for food overcame her regularly, in more or less large distances. Each time she decided to eat less and healthier from now on. But only a few hours later the good resolutions were mostly forgotten and the greed for the delicacies so great that they were again delightfully bitten into the next piece of cake or into a bar of chocolate.

That's exactly how it was the next morning. When she got up with big eyes at half past six because her alarm clock was ringing, the frustration of yesterday evening was almost forgotten. The memory of it, tried to repress it. She would have liked to have stayed in a cuddly, warm bed a little longer, but today her application training began and she had no choice. She had no choice but to get up.

When she pulled up the blinds and opened the window, the sun was already shining from the blue sky and the air was springlike mild.

"What a beautiful sunny day! Winter is coming to an end, at last." She stretched and stretched yawning. "It's worth going right out there. But first, have a nice breakfast. There's plenty of time before I have to go.

It doesn't start till nine o'clock, the course."

She enjoyed her breakfast, consisting of a large cup of coffee, four slices of toast bread with Nutella and a bowl of cornflakes, and surfed the Internet like every morning. There she read the latest news from all over the world on Twitter and Facebook.

"Oh shit, it's Marc's birthday today, I would have missed it if Facebook wouldn't show it to me. But you can't remember everything. Write a nice greeting right away - although I hardly hear anything from him. Actually, I might as well drop it and congratulate him on his birthday. Always those fake friends you're not really friends with....... How long has it been since I last saw him! I haven't worked with him for years Well, I'm just a nice person and think of my former colleagues".

After all, she was so absorbed in her timeline and the cute animal videos that were shown to her that she almost forgot that today was not a normal day, where she had plenty of time, but she had to go to application training. Why did time always have to go by so quickly when you were sitting at your laptop? The time seemed to become independent and to have one minute not 60 seconds more but only 30 seconds left. Everyone who surfed on the Internet probably knew this phenomenon.

Nevertheless, she managed to get ready in time, took the subway to the S-Train station on time - and there she stood waiting for the train that usually came every ten minutes, but just didn't want to come today. Suddenly a loudspeaker announcement sounded:

"Due to a technical malfunction, there are unfortunately delays in train services on the S42 line. We ask for your understanding"

Oh, great! Technical malfunction on the first day of her application training, exactly on the line she had to drive!

Sharon 's good mood, which she had still had when she got up, when she had been smiled at so beautifully by the radiant sun, vanished by the way. After a felt eternity of waiting, a train finally arrived, which was of course overcrowded with annoyed passengers. Luckily she only had to stand four stations in the crowded S-Bahn until she reached her destination. After another five minutes on foot she finally reached the building where the application training took place.

It was ten minutes after nine when she opened the door to the training room. All participants and the lecturer focused their attention on Sharon.

"Good morning. I'm Mrs. Schröder. I'm sorry I'm late, but there was a technical incident on the subway. I waited there forever."

"Good morning. Sit in an empty seat. The S-Bahn has also become really bad, these constant failures. But everyone else made it on time. The best thing to do tomorrow is to start a little earlier and include this in your schedule, which could happen something unforeseen. This is part of the foresighted planning, which I teach you here in application training, among other things. You never know what's gonna happen and what's coming."

The lecturer's voice had an instructive, strict undertone that Sharon didn't like at all. This could become something, with that!

From one of the seats she heard the muffled voice of a man who apparently spoke to his seat neighbor.

"Maybe it wasn't the S-Bahn, but the masses she was carrying around with her. You can't move that fast." Giggling followed.

Sharon gave him a nasty look. "It certainly wasn't that," she whispered to him, feeling her bright red.

Actually, she was rather reserved and not necessarily the one who reacted quick-witted. But she couldn't hold back from remarks like that. Too often she'd been hurt because of her looks.

What an asshole! She thought, but didn't want to say it. The lecturer abstained from commenting and continued with her introductory lecture, which she had interrupted because of Sharon.

It turned out during this first day of class that the man who had blasphemed Sharon was called Kai and was generally a pain in the ass. Again and again he attracted attention with cheeky sayings and comments.

"Well, this can be cheerful, with this quay," Sharon whispered to her table neighbour Sabine.

"Yes, terrible the guy!" Sabine agreed with her. "Luckily, I don't have it at home, so I'd get a divorce right away. Oh, nonsense, what do you mean, divorce? I wouldn't let that happen in my life."

Sharon giggled. "No, me neither."

Sharon got along with Sabine at first go. She was a few years older than herself, almost forty, not exactly the slimmest either, but by no means as overweight as Sharon. Beside her she could bite into her bread, which was thickly covered with meat sausage, without expecting a stupid saying I have to.

When it was finally over at 3 pm, not only Sharon found that the first day had been quite tiring. And that should go on for the rest of the week! Hopefully the next few days will be less boring. From tomorrow they wanted to start writing applications and get the right polish, as the lecturer had expressed herself.

"You'll see, with the right application. They won't be sorted out right away. You are one of the short-listed and have a good chance of receiving an invitation for an interview."

But Sharon was rather skeptical. Sure, the application should be good, not slammed. But whether what the lecturer taught them would really have such a success? Well, she'd see if it made a difference on her next applications. Today there had been primarily information on how to apply properly. You could hardly imagine what you could do wrong and what people actually did wrong! It was a mystery to Sharon how adults came up with the idea of applying without a name or address, not adding a phone number, or simply applying on a detached check sheet, handwritten and full of spelling mistakes. Either these people didn't want to get the job they were applying for and they only applied because the job center forced them to, or they simply lacked intelligence. In any case, the lecturer assured that all the applications she had submitted had actually taken place in this way.

Chapter 2

On the way home, Sharon quickly went into the discount store to buy some groceries and was happy when she finally arrived home shortly after four o'clock. From the exhausting first day of job application training and dragging the shopping all done.

Her eyes fell on a removal van standing in front of the house. Two people were about to carry a couch into the house. That must be the entry of the new neighbors among her. The apartment had been empty for the last two months after the old Mrs. Lehmann had moved to the senior citizens' residence. I hope they were nice people.

As Sharon slowly followed the men up the stairs with the couch, she saw a young man standing in the door of Mrs. Lehmann's former apartment. The two men put the couch upright in front of the apartment door.

"Go by first, young lady," said the older of the two men.

Sharon thanked and greeted the handsome blonde man standing at the front door.

"Are you the new tenant? I'm Sharon Schröder and I live right above them." She hoped that didn't sound too curious.

"Hello! Yes, I'm the new tenant. Joshua Miller. Well, here's to good neighborhood!"

He smiled at her friendly and Sharon noticed his bright blue eyes. She would have liked to have stopped and exchanged a few words with this Mr. Miller. But that seemed a little too pushy for her.

The men were certainly more interested in the couch and all the other furniture and cartons that were still in the removal van, in the than chatting with her. But as soon as she was in her apartment, her curiosity did not let her go and she could not help but run to the window and, standing behind the curtain, watch as the men unloaded the transporter.

"Joshua Miller," she murmured to herself. "Not bad. He'd be something for me."

But in the next moment she gave her joy about the new acquaintance a damper herself.

"As if he'd even look at me! He greeted me friendly, why not, as a new neighbour, but there probably won't be anything more. He certainly doesn't like the hippopotamus I am."

She turned her eyes away from the window and went into the kitchen to finally unpack her groceries and prepare dinner. Spaghetti with Bolognese sauce should be here today. Freshly boiled Bolognese sauce, no instant sauce. She didn't put anything like that on the table. Even though she had little money and let herself go, she at least cooked with fresh ingredients as far as possible and was not a fast food junkies. Well, the one or other frozen pizza also found its way into her stomach, just like she liked to get herself a kebab. But since cooking was her passion, she rarely had ready meals.

While she was cooking, she was constantly thinking about her new neighbour. Again and again she ran to the window and took a look at the transporter that was still standing in front of the front door.

I don't even know this guy! Maybe he has a wife or girlfriend, maybe he isn't as likeable as he seemed at first glance, she tried to persuade herself. But her thoughts just didn't want to wander away from him.

"This hasn't happened to me for a long time, that somebody fascinates me like that".

Shaking her head, she wrapped some spaghetti on the fork, led it to her mouth - and jumped open immediately when she heard the door under her open and the men said goodbye to each other. She pressed her ear against the apartment door to hear better. But then the door under her closed and she heard the footsteps of the men down the stairs.

She ran quickly to the window. The two men who had just carried the couch up the stairs got into the furniture van and drove away. The move was obviously done. It was quiet under her. A woman's voice had not yet been heard and there had been no woman to be seen. At least Joshua Miller seemed to have moved into the apartment alone.

She sat down again at the table and ate on. The tabloid magazine "Taff" ran on television, but she didn't listen at all today. While eating the dessert, a chocolate cream pudding, she suddenly paused and dropped the spoon into the cup.

"If I keep eating like this, he won't look at me! I have to stop stuffing myself like this!"

She felt a tear rolling down her cheek. "My whole life would be different if I wasn't so fat! I might have a chance with Joshua and I might finally find a job again - and besides, I wouldn't always sweat so fast and get out of breath so fast. My knees already hurt when I walk stairs. I'll ruin my health if I don't finally do something. But it is the only thing I enjoy - eating, cooking, baking, and of course watching TV and surfing the Internet. What else have I got?"

As more tears ran down her cheeks, she picked up her chocolate pudding again and ate it further.

"Now I've started it, now I'm eating it too. He won't end up in the garbage. But at least I could start with some sport today. Afterwards, when I watch a movie, I'll do some exercises."

That was easier said than done. It wasn't her first attempt at sports. Again and again she had failed and gave up her plan before she had really started. Around 8 pm, when she was sitting in front of the news, she still felt too full of dinner and postponed her sport exercises to 9 pm. At 9 pm, in the middle of the film, she thought that she wanted to start sports today, but didn't feel like getting up and starting. It was just so nice and comfortable on the couch and the film exciting! At 10 pm, when the film was over and she was zapping on another programme, she wondered if she shouldn't start playing sports tomorrow. One day is no longer important.

But then her guilty conscience began to move. She knew she would have the same excuses every night, shifting the sport to the next day every day if she didn't just start. She knew herself and had to admit that this had always been the case. So she decided to start with very simple exercises from the couch, set the timer on her phone to ten minutes and did some loosening and stretching exercises on her arms and legs while sitting. The ten minutes seemed to drag on forever and seemed almost like an hour to her. But she at least held out - and when she wanted to get some sweets from the kitchen afterwards as a reward, she pulled herself together, overcame her desire for sweets and simply drank her cup of tea instead. Then she surfed another one a bit on the Internet, until she finally went to sleep around 11 pm and fell asleep with the thoughts of her new neighbor.

The second day of application training was as boring as the first. Sharon would have preferred to drop out of the course and not go back. She didn't see much sense in this class. She knew how to write an application and how to behave in an interview. Anyway, she didn't think she'd learn much in this course. Even if the lecturer emphasized again and again that they would be amazed at how much the training would bring them. A large part of the participants seemed to have no interest at all in the application training and to participate only forcedly in it. These participants seemed correspondingly unmotivated. While the teacher was trying to give lessons, some participants were busy with their mobile phones and did not listen to the teacher at all. Until he burst his collar and she had an absolute ban on mobile phones during lessons. Which in turn led to heated discussions. Even though Sharon was only compelled to participate, she was at least quiet, listening most of the time, unless she was absent with her thoughts, and tried to take at least a little bit of knowledge with her. As on the first day, however, she was happy when the lessons finally came to an end at fifteen o'clock after six long hours. She said goodbye to Sabine, wished her a nice remaining day and hurried home. You might have thought someone was waiting for her at home. But she just wanted to get away and make herself comfortable on her couch at home.

Arriving home, she noticed a motorcycle outside her front door that had never been there before. I wonder if it belonged to the new neighbor. If so, then he must have been home by now. Maybe she met him right in the stairwell.

She felt a little nervousness coming up, bit herself on her dry lips, stroked a strand of hair from her face and didn't know how to look inconspicuously up at his window without him noticing if he stood at the window and saw her. What was wrong with her? How could this strange man she knew nothing about make her so nervous?

She slowly pulled her key out of her handbag, then spent a lot of time looking for mail in her mailbox to increase the chance that she would meet him in the stairwell. But nothing happened. There was no mail in the mailbox, only advertising from the pizza service, which she immediately threw into the waiting trash. Slowly she walked up the stairs, stopped for a moment in front of his apartment door. Nothing. Nothing. No noise came out of the apartment and the door didn't open either. She couldn't stay outside his door for long, she knew that, because it would look a little strange if he suddenly opened the door, and she would stand in front of him. It would look like she was listening. Which she did somehow, even if she didn't put her ear to the door, as she had done at her own door, but just stood in the stairwell. So she didn't stay long in front of Joshua Miller's apartment door and walked on, one staircase higher into her own apartment.

But only five minutes later she was walking through the stairwell again, a garbage bag in her hand. It was the first time she had grabbed the garbage right after coming home to take it down. Normally she took a break before she started with the household chores. But today was different. She really wanted to see Joshua again and hoped to meet him. This time she did not stop at Joshua Siebert's door but simply walked past it. Everything else would have been a bit conspicuous, if he had noticed something, she said to herself. She didn't even know if he was in the apartment at all. Back in her apartment from the garbage dump, she shook her head about her behavior.

"Man, what's my problem? I don't even know this guy! I've seen him once before, for a minute, that's it - and I'm pretending here it's my great love!"

On the other hand, she had to admit that it was not reprehensible to fall in love with someone at first sight - or at least to develop sympathies for someone at first sight and to find him interesting. What spoke against that? Besides, this Joshua had a positive effect on her. She had started off with a little exercise, which she hadn't done for years, and yesterday she had managed to give up the candy she had wanted to get from the kitchen after exercise, and even now while she was preparing dinner, bratwurst with potatoes and sauerkraut, she decided to skip the portion a little smaller than it would normally have been. Instead of three there were two sausages, she had cooked one potato less and the portion of sauerkraut with deliciously crispy fried bacon was not as big as usual. Instead of choosing her beloved large chocolate pudding for dessert, she decided on a small fruit yoghurt. After all, it was a start.

After dinner, she googled her new neighbor. She didn't find out much about him. He was on Facebook, just like her, but she couldn't find out anything about him except his profile picture because his profile wasn't public. He had protected it, as she herself did with her profile. Only his profile photo was able to see her as well as his place of residence. She would have had to send him a friend request first, and he would have had to confirm it to find out more about him and get insight into his chronicle.

"What a bummer! I can't just send him a friend request. Nah, I can't...He's wondering why I've been so.

We'll send a friend request to our neighbor, even though we don't know each other yet. We haven't talked more than the words of welcome when we moved in. I let the search be for him now times and look what there is on Youtube in sports videos. But it's a nice picture of him. His blue eyes are showing to advantage."

After playing a few sports videos, she decided on one where Pilates for beginners was taught. That seemed the best thing for her. So she put on her sweatpants and started her first Pilates training. The video went half an hour, but already after ten minutes she had had enough and gave up wheezing and sweating. It was something else to participate in the training on the video than simply doing ten minutes of movement exercises.

"I can't go on! How am I supposed to hold this shit for 30 minutes? I can't take any more, it's too much for me!" Breathing heavily, she leaned on the couch and paused for a moment until her breath became more even and calm and her pulse stopped beating so fast.

Furious at her inability to keep up the whole video, she stomped into the kitchen and ate the chocolate pudding she had renounced after dinner. While she ate it, she encouraged herself a little.

After all, I did something at all and ten minutes are quite nice for the beginning, better than nothing. Yesterday I already did ten minutes of gymnastics on the couch. The only thing I shouldn't have eaten was the pudding, that's what's going to put back the calories I've just trampled on. On the other hand, I would normally have eaten the pudding without exercising. So it did do something, I guess."

Chapter 3

When Sharon woke up the next morning, she felt tired and sick. What was that all about? Last night she hadn't had any sign of getting sick yet. She was thinking about what might be the reason. She had started the sport yesterday evening, that had only been a few minutes, it couldn't be because of that. Or could ten minutes of sports have such an extreme effect on her? Bullshit! she wiped the thought away. I don't think that's the reason. She had started not to eat so much anymore, well, at least she had tried. The fact that the attempt hadn't really been successful hardly brought about this feeling of being ill. Then she suddenly remembered that she had cried last night and had fallen asleep crying. Once again everything had broken out of her, all the crap had come up to her. How fat she was, how disgusting she found herself with all that fat and that a man like her new neighbor would certainly not look at her the way she looked - and on top of that she was unemployed and had to take part in this cursed job application training that didn't help anyway. It was just wasted time.

She rolled back and forth in bed, rubbed her eyes and then sat up. There was no point in lying in bed even if she wasn't well. She had to go to application training. Otherwise she would have to go to the doctor and get a sick note - and that in turn would mean that she would probably get another job application training because she couldn't finish it. Nah, I'd rather go sick and get it over with, she thought. There were only three days left, then the week was over. Somehow she'd make it through those three days.

When she looked at herself in the mirror, however, she wanted to go back to the bed crawling, but she resisted the urge, got ready for class and had breakfast. Without thinking much about it, she prepared her usual breakfast and noticed that she did not suffer from loss of appetite at all. But loss of appetite would have been very welcome to her now. So she left a slice of the usual four slices of toast bread with Nutella. She had already completely emptied the bowl of cornflakes when she remembered that she wanted to eat less. It was simply the power of habit that she had made herself the usual portion of cornflakes. But such a slice of toast with Nutella, which she now left out, that was at least a good start. That was definitely 200 calories you saved right now in the morning, if not more. If she managed to save another 200 calories for the rest of the day, that would be 400 calories - and if she could keep that up a week, that would be 3200 calories less a week.

That's probably a kilo she'd lose.

During the day, it turned out that the feeling of sickness was not only caused by the howling of the evening, because it was accompanied by a cold and the first signs of coughing and headaches. She must have caught a nasty infection! Just when she had to do that stupid job application training! Why did diseases always have to come at the wrong moment? Next week she could have rested comfortably at home, nobody would have minded if she had spent the day in bed or lying on the couch, nobody would have even noticed that she was sick. But now she had to hold out this week, no matter how sick she was, not to be put into the next application training after her illness.

After the course, she went straight home and simply skipped the planned shopping. She just didn't have the strength to buy anymore. The fact that she had kept up the application training the whole day at all had already been an achievement. It was easy for her.

I didn't like it. Several times she had been on the verge of going home. She wouldn't starve to death if she didn't go shopping today.

After all, there was enough in the fridge and in the larder to survive the next few days - and since she wanted to lose weight anyway, it couldn't hurt not to buy new supplies of food again. Sharon shook his aching head.

"Damn it, all I have left is losing weight, losing weight, losing weight in my head! A few days ago I wasn't really interested in what I was stuffing into myself, and now? All the time I have to think about losing weight - and only because of this guy who moved in under me!"

After the first moment of rage, a smile spread over her face. "Well, there's definitely something good about him moving in, whether it's going to be something with him or not. It has caused me to overcome my inner pig and not let myself go like that anymore.

At least I'll try and take the first step."

When she entered the house, she heard a door open on the first floor. Oh, God, that must be him. How do I look? Just today, when I'm so sick. That's bullshit! Their minds were spinning.

She quickly drove her hands through her hair to straighten it a little, but she knew that wouldn't do much good now either. As she took the first step of the stairs, she heard the key in the lock of the apartment door, and the next moment she heard footsteps coming towards her. She kept her eyes lowered, didn't want to look up curiously to see if it really was him. Then she heard a friendly "hello!"

She looked up, saw her new neighbour, smiling friendly, and returned the greeting. She had the feeling that he would have to hear her beating heart and she hoped that she wouldn't start to get red too much. But it didn't really matter, because before he noticed it, he was already down the stairs, past her and she heard him open the front door.

She shook her head over herself. What a stupid cow I am! Why am I so nervous when I see him? I want to see him, I want to get into conversation with him, I want him to notice me! My goodness! Pull yourself together, Sharon!

Panting from the effort of climbing stairs, which today was due not only to

her overweight but also to her illness, she unlocked her apartment, closed the door and leaned her back against it.

Suddenly she became dizzy, the floor under her feet seemed to sway, her ears hummed. She felt her knees go soft. So she staggered, leaning against the wall, into the bedroom and let herself fall onto the bed. She felt the weakness in her circulation take possession of her whole body. She didn't lie down a moment too early. Her heart beat against her chest like it was about to jump out. She closed her eyes, tried to breathe more calmly and to regain her strength. What was wrong with her? Should she call an ambulance? She was home alone after all. No one would look after her and notice if she passed out. While she was still thinking about it, her circulation recovered and she felt a little better.

I guess that was too much today. I should have stayed home. I guess I got all caught up in the flu, she thought. Even if the circulation calmed down, she felt a weakness in her whole body. She was also totally tired and exhausted with once. Just rest a few minutes, take a little nap, then I get up again. But as soon as she had grasped this thought, she had already fallen asleep.

When she awoke, it was pitch dark. At first she wasn't quite sure why she was fully dressed, lying in her bed. Even the she still had shoes on her feet. Her head hurt and when she sat down on the edge of the bed, she felt that the rest of her body also hurt. She wanted to get up and realized how weak she was. I've got the flu! Now I remember. I went to bed because I had the flu and couldn't hold on to my legs anymore. What time is it anyway? She took her shoes off her feet, felt her way to the floor lamp directly behind the headboard of her bed and switched on the light. Immediately she closed her eyes, pain distorted. It took a while for her to get used to the light, which seemed brighter than ever to her today. A glance at her wristwatch showed that it was ten o'clock. So she had been lying here since the afternoon, which was about six hours. Still, she felt like she hadn't closed her eyes in days.

So I can not enter the class tomorrow, it shot her through the head. What am I going to do? I don't want to be absent. But there's nothing else I can do.

After she felt physically able to get up, she stood up, took a slow step, palpating her way along the wall with one hand as a precaution, into the kitchen. She wanted to make herself a cup of tea first.

Camomile tea or peppermint tea, depending on what she would find in the cupboard. She found a pack of peppermint tea and made herself a cup of it. She wasn't hungry at all. But at least she wanted to eat a little something. She made herself a cheese sandwich, sat down at the kitchen table with bread and freshly brewed tea - and became aware of the irony of the situation. All those days, she'd struggled to eat less to lose weight. How hard it was for her! And now she was sick and she didn't have to fight at all to lose weight, because she had no appetite to stuff herself with food. When was the last time she sat at the table with such a barren meal? A slice of bread with cheese, that was usually a small snack for her. But today it was her dinner, the only thing she would eat today, after she hadn't eaten since noon today. Now she even had to smile a little. Sometimes it can be so easy to lose weight. Just get sick and your pounds will tumble!

Even this one loaf of bread she could only get down with difficulty. The appetite just didn't want to adjust. She hadn't been that bad in a long time. The next morning's visit to the doctor would be inevitable. Unless, of course, when she woke up tomorrow morning, her condition would have changed dramatically.

After the meagre meal she dragged herself into the bathroom to measure fever. That she had some was obvious, she didn't necessarily need a thermometer for that. Her forehead felt hot and her face was red as a look in the mirror showed her. The only question was how high that fever was.

A few moments later she was able to read a temperature of 39.5 degrees.

Nothing else I expected, she thought. I think I'd better lie down right away. Would it be better if I told somebody? What if I pass out and die of circulatory failure because nobody knows I'm here at home? That may sound a little exaggerated, but for sure it was safe. Now it occurred to her again that she had already considered calling an ambulance before she had gone to bed. She didn't call him now, but she wrote her sister about Whatsapp:

"I'm sick, with a fever and everything. Call me back tomorrow, if not, see if I'm still alive!"

Then she undressed, slipped into a pair of pyjamas, and took the cell phone with her to bed. The next moment she heard that a message had arrived.

"Then I wish you a speedy recovery! I'll call you tomorrow."

Well, at least her sister Melanie had contacted me right away. That was at never sure how long it took her to answer. Sometimes an answer came promptly, sometimes Sharon waited for hours until she got a message back. The relationship between the sisters was neither particularly cordial nor particularly bad. It was average. They wrote each other from time to time, made phone calls from time to time and saw each other occasionally, but not very often.

Sometimes months passed before they saw each other again, but sometimes they saw each other more often. Melanie had a husband and child, worked as a medical assistant in a family practice. Since she had her daughter, Pauline, they saw each other even less than before.

Besides Melanie, Sharon 's family consisted of her mother Katharina, who had moved to Hamburg with her new partner, and to whom the relationship was rather difficult. Sharon had last seen her mother half a year ago when she had been visiting Melanie for a few days. Hamburg wasn't far away, it didn't take two hours by train to get to Hamburg. Sharon 's father Stefan, from whom her mother had been divorced for many years, continued to live in Berlin, but Sharon had little contact with him. He also had a new partner, but Sharon and Miriam didn't get along very well. So one saw oneself only occasionally to celebrations, like birthdays or Christmas.

That night Sharon sweatted a lot, woke up wet and sweaty over and over again, but also immediately awakened from lead-heavy tiredness. The next morning, she heard the alarm clock with half an ear, but let it ring without caring. She was just too broken to get up at six this morning and take part in application training. Afterwards, during the day she would go to the doctor, sometime when her body would allow to drag herself out of bed. Around ten o'clock in the morning she finally got up, showered on wobbly legs. Since she was so sweaty from the night, she simply didn't want to remain unshowered despite her poor health condition. The shower did well, despite the persistent circulatory problems.

Her weakness was accompanied by a sore throat and cough as well as a severe cold. For breakfast she made herself a chamomile tea and a Nutellatoast. Finally, she called the educational institute where her course took place, apologizing with a croaking, hoarse voice for today and the rest of the week. Then she called the doctor, because she needed a certificate of incapacity for work, which she had to present to the job centre. She got an appointment for the late afternoon, half past five. She did not yet know how she would make it to the doctor in this condition, but hoped that it would improve a bit by the afternoon. The fever thermometer still showed 39 degrees - at least half a degree less than yesterday evening, even if the fever was still very high.

Sharon spent the time until the doctor's appointment lying on the couch in front of the television. She kept dozing off. To be on the safe side, the alarm clock had turned itself on so as not to miss her doctor's appointment. It was the first day in a very long time that she had hardly eaten anything and thus, unintentionally, was on a diet. At least the flu had to have something good! However, she would have preferred to be healthy and continue her application training, even if she didn't like going there, just to get it over with.„

She finally went to the doctor on shaky legs. Her circulation was now stable enough to take the road. Fortunately, the doctor's office was not far away. It was just a footpath of three blocks she had to get behind her. With a sick note for a week and a diagnosis of a flu-like infection, she left the doctor's office after less than an hour and was happy when she returned home. Exhausted, she lay down on the couch and zapped through the television program.

Suddenly the doorbell rang. At first she thought of it, just to ignore the ringing. But since it was clearly the apartment door and not the front door where someone had rung the bell, they had to stand in front of their apartment door and probably heard the sounds of the TV through the door. So it was clear to her that she was at home and she couldn't ignore the ringing. Slowly she sat up, which the head thanked her with a violent pain.

"What a shit, just today, when I'm so sick, someone has to ring the bell. Can't be true,"... she murmured to herself.

Usually she would look through the spyhole before opening the door when she wasn't expecting anyone, but today she just opened it, without any precautions. She almost threw an unfriendly "what do they want from me" at the troublemaker - when she jerked away in shock.

Oh, my goodness! There he was! He, her neighbor, under her, her neighbor, the one she...

"Hello Mrs. Schröder, excuse me for disturbing you, but I just wanted to let you know that it might get a little louder on Saturday, into the late evening, because I have a housewarming party... "

"Hello, yeah, okay, yeah, yeah, sure, don't worry, thanks for letting me know. Then I wish you a lot of fun at the party... " she croaked and stuttered.

"Oh, dear, you've got a cold. Then I wish you a speedy recovery! I don't want to interrupt, I'm off again, bye!"

He nodded to her and was already on his way down when she replied: "Yes, thank you!"

She closed the door and could hear her heart pounding. Oh, God, today of all days, now of all times, he's ringing my bell! That can't be true - and I look like shit!

She turned around and looked in the mirror next to the dressing room. What she saw in it confirmed her suspicions. She looked terrible! The hair uncombed and wildly mixed, the face unpainted and pale. Shaking her head, she went back into the living room and lay down on the couch again. Can't change anything now, she thought a little frustrated - and suddenly she even had to grin a little, although she didn't feel like laughing at all.

Now he's seen me at least once without makeup and unkempt. Others experience this only after the first night with their new girlfriend, if at all. My chances with him won't be any worse than before, because I have no chance at all, as fat as I am, the ugly appearance today probably doesn't matter any more.

She spent the rest of the evening lying on the couch in front of the television again. She dozed off a bit every now and then and didn't get much of what she actually saw. Tomorrow she would certainly be better already, such a flu-like infection did not last forever. What kind of day was today anyway? Oh, yes, Thursday. Until Saturday there were only two days left so the celebration will take place. Well, it doesn't matter, I'm not invited, why should I, I have nothing to do with him, he doesn't know anything about the fact that I have...... a crush on him As much as she tried not to think about him, she didn't succeed. He just didn't want to disappear from her mind despite the aching head. But somehow it was nice that there was someone she could think of and that somehow she wasn't as alone as before. Because there was someone, even if only in his head - and in his heart, not in reality, but there was someone...

On Saturday she feverishly awaited, in the truest sense of the word, the inauguration party of her neighbour. The whole evening, she lay in wait, standing again and again at the window, behind the curtain, to see the arriving guests.

What kind of people might he have invited? What kind of people was he with?

And maybe there was a girlfriend after all, even though she hadn't seen him with any woman before? After all, he hadn't lived here long. There could be many reasons why she hadn't seen him with his girlfriend before. Finally, her waiting was rewarded and she could take a look at the first two, presumed, guests. A couple his age and a man who came alone, a little older than Joshua Miller. Sharon heard it ring a floor down. As a matter of fact, they were his guests. So did she guess right. She left her seat by the window and rushed to the apartment door. Not that she wanted to open it, no, that went a little too far for her and would have been embarrassing if someone had noticed her standing in the open door listening to the arriving guests of her neighbour. That would look like old gossips...

Instead, she held her ear to her closed apartment door, listening, and tried to understand what was spoken in the stairwell or at the apartment door. More than a few words, greetings and the same, she could not understand. She knew it was silly what she was doing, but somehow she couldn't help it. The curiosity was simply too great. Her head hurt and her circulation wasn't up to scratch either, but just lying in bed or on the couch all the time while celebrating underneath her, she couldn't and didn't want to. How she would have liked to have been there now and would have celebrated with him, got to know him better, Joshua. Yes, Joshua, that's what she called him from now on. No more "my new neighbor" or "the Miller" as she had called him in her mind so far. Joshua. As if they were already better known, they had already toasted their friendship.

It rang several times without her having seen the guests from the window before, because it was too exhausting for her to stand at the window for so long in her ill state. But to get up from the couch and listen with the ear at the door when she heard it ringing down, the she'd do it again and again.

If he knew what I was doing here, I think I'd be through with him down there, he wouldn't look at me anymore - or rather, he wouldn't even start looking at me, she said. I really can't tell anybody what I'm doing here. Well, though, I don't think I'm the only woman who behaves like that when she's in love with someone.

Am I already in love? Can you call it that? Is it more than just interest? The answer was a shrug.

She finally lay down on the couch again, with a fresh, hot cup of tea on the table. The TV didn't show up tonight, the background noise would only disturb. But she heard all the better the background noise from the apartment below her, where they obviously sat happily together, according to the frequent laughter. Every now and then a few louder word fragments pushed up to Sharon, but first and foremost she could listen to the music, from rock to pop and pop songs everything was there. At some point you started singing along, probably a little buzzed. Sharon had to smile first, then a sigh escaped her.

"Oh, man, if only I were there! What kind of fun would I have down there instead of just lying here? Okay, I'm not healthy yet, the headaches and weakness might spoil the party a little, but it would be better than lying up here alone on the couch."

At some point Sharon fell asleep and didn't hear anything about the party under her. Only when she woke up and everything around her was quiet did she realize that she had missed the end of the celebration. But that didn't matter after all. She'd gotten enough to know it must have been a nice housewarming party. She got up from the couch.

Alittle wobbly on her legs, changed her clothes and went to bed. She was so tired that she fell asleep within a few moments without worrying much about her neighbour.